completely. jim and carl, of course, a lot of famous residents, a lot of homes that are worth multimillions here. the concern is the wind damage because a lot of those are up on the hill. they don't think the storm surge will reach a lot of those homes. back to you. >> thanks so much, brian shactman in montauk. made the point about insurers early in the program. >> they're ready. >> tonight on "mad?" >> there is some news. allen mckim, buying -- >> booking on a day like today is not easy. >> thank you, buddy. >> that does it for "squawk on the street." let's get to the fast money halftime, right over there. >> carl, thanks very much. welcome to a special edition of the halftime report. we're tracking the very latest from hurricane sandy as it churns towards the northeast with more than 50 million people in its path. the superstorm now expected to slam into the south central new jersey coast sometime later this evening. power outages expected to be

widespread. transit systems from new york to boston already shut down. nearly 8,000 flights canceled thus far. financial markets are closed as well and may very well be dark again tomorrow. in fact, water already moving in to lower manhattan. that's where we find our scott cohn in battery park. scott? >> reporter: hi there, scott. at the moment, it's just sort of a miserable, cloudy, cold, rainy day. and if that were the worst of it, that would be fine. earlier this morning at high tide, as we were standing here at the battery, there was water up to about here coming in from new york harbor. when the storm comes through and you have storm surge on top of that and the full moon, you could be looking at water coming up around here. obviously i would not be able to be standing here. that's what has everyone in manhattan worried. because that gets you into all sorts of issues with flooding, steam tunnels, subways, potentially electrical lines. that could cause some damage in

addition to just disrupting things. let me give you a sense of what's going on in and around manhattan. the world trade center site, ground zero, the september 11th memorial not too far from here. they have 80 pumps now ready to go in case they need to pump that out. and several hundreds more on standby as well as 1,000 national guard troops activated there. elsewhere, manhattan is really sort of a ghost town as they wait for this storm to come through. 375,000 people in the evacuation zones. and many are heeding that, but not everyone has. and that has city officials concerned. here's new york city mayor mike bloomberg. >> if you are still in zone "a" and can find a way to leave, leave immediately. conditions are deteriorating very rapidly and the window for you getting out safely is closing. >> reporter: it's been interesting to watch. some preparations actually still going on this morning, which

means they really weren't thinking that clearly about all of this. because some of the conditions were already supposed to have deter rated by now. but a lot of the sandbagging we've seen has been going on today. that, as the mayor said, the window for all of that, for all of those preparations is closing fast. we expect this is going to be a rough afternoon heading into a rough evening, continuing through tomorrow. scott? >> scott, thanks so much from lower manhattan. the mayor already announcing skoo schools will be closed in new york city yet again tomorrow. at the top of the show we mentioned the new york stock exchange and nasdaq are closed for business today. if business is mostly electronic, why are the markets closed? bob pisani has the latest there. it's one of those questions you would ask. really we know why the markets are closed today. >> it's because it's not just electronic. there are human becomes here. that's really the key here. electronic trading is trading using computers to make the trades. there's still plenty of humans behind those trades. human market makers for the nasdaq and new york stock exchange. there's thousands of people

working on cell site trading disks at brokerage firms and thousands more working on the buy side in hedge funds and mutual funds in and around the city. take those people out of the equation because they're not able to get to work, and you have very, very thin markets. with the heightened concern about liquidity and market stability, the risk of trying to get people to work without injury, the risk something could go wrong with a market with few participants and not a lot of people to fix the problems, well, all those risks just outweighed any of the benefits. it does highlight, scott, the fact that new york remains the center of the stock trading universe. that might be something to debate, whether we should continue to have that. but that's the case for better or worse. >> we heard from duncan earlier this morning. expectations we'll likely be closed tomorrow again. >> we'll make an announcement. we'll hear from the nyse and other exchanges probably in the next two hours. i think you can bet for sure it'll probably be closed tomorrow. the focus is wednesday. wednesday is the end of the month. a lot of firms have a p & l. to

report to investors for the end of the month. that's kind of an important date to get open. the hope here i think is that you get a skeletal crew on the floor of the new york stock exchange. everything opens even if it's a shortened trading session. at least you open it. >> first time in 19 years the new york stock exchange closing because of weather. we'll welcome in the traders as well. stick around. mike murphy, brian kelly, jon najarian with us for the full hour even though we don't have the trading. good to see all of you. hopefully your friends, families and loved ones stay safe through all this. bob, there is this unwritten rule, i guess, the stock exchange doesn't even like to stay closed for four days in a row. i don't know if it's a hard thing on paper or not. saturday, sunday, monday and likely tuesday it will be shut down. >> for very good reasons. people need to see what the prices of their stocks are. you need to have an active trading market. i don't think they're doing this because they necessarily want to. i think it was the right call to make. it's not just trading electronic market. you're not trading with compute rs.

you're trading with real humans even if it's done electronically. >> one of my guys has a question. was it j.j.? >> oh, hey, bob. how are zhyou? >> j.j. and dr. j., you as well. >> what i'm wondering, bob, on this one we say probably wednesday. so i think most of us are discounting tomorrow. do you foresee wednesday just being, like, a two or three-hour day? just pretty much completely and you're really wiping out the hope of a full day? >> i think the important thing is they want to get prices for the end of the day -- for the end of the month. i think that's really the most important thing. i think there's a fairly high probability that it will be a shortened trading day. again the question is going to be i think it's unlikely the subways are going to be open. that's going to limit the number of people that are going to potentially be in. if they feel it's safe for people to either drive in or get down there some way, you might be able to open with a skeletal crew. >> jon? >> sorry, jon. >> no worries. >> bob, as a follow-up, you foresee a lot of the earnings

announcements being kicked out also? >> i'm surprised a number of have already been delayed. we saw that with pfizer. you'd think they'd be able to get the conference calls together. doesn't seem to be that difficult. it's happen bdened with a number of them. >> pfizer's global headquarters are right in new york city. not far from midtown. >> joe's right. as far as the earnings, a lot of firms it seems want to wait. perhaps we might have a flood of those earnings if they all wait till wednesday morning, for instance, judge. because a lot of the firms that don't want to declare today or tomorrow will, again, wait until, perhaps, the opening on wednesday on top of all those other openings. and one of the issues that bob addressed very well is the s&p 500 at a monthly expiration, you need the openings of each of those stocks in the s&p 500. it's not pegged to the future. it's pegged to the individual openings of all of those stocks. which might seem like, you know, that's just a little minuscule thing. but it's not. it can swing that s&p by several

dollars either way. so whether it's a skeleton crew and just a half an hour or hour worth of trading, they need to get that done and they need to get it open for the end of the month. >> a more important issue than even the earnings reports being delayed is the possibility that the jobs report on friday could potentially be delayed. they have not made a decision on that in washington. >> which could be very big implications for election day. somewhat lost in all of this, just at the early part of next week. bob, thanks so much. keep us up to date if we hear from any of the major exchanges. >> i think we'll know within the next two hours. right now sandy is packing its biggest punch along the southern jersey shore. that's where kayla tausche is. >> reporter: the rain's been picking up throughout the morning. the wind as well. we just got out of a press conference with the mayor of cape may, new jersey, which is where we stand right now saying that winds are up to 49 miles per hour here. when sandy makes landfall near cape may later today that those

winds will be 85 to 90 miles an hour. the mayor also saying that four out of seven weather models that the state of new jersey are using right now show that the landfall will take place between cape may and overlap in atlantic ci city. now, that is very, very key. the high tide, though. you saw the tides throughout manhattan. here in new jersey, high tide is expected around 8:30 p.m. at the same time those winds are going to turn in a direction that will bring all the water inland. that's going to cause even more problems for flooding which we've already seen all over the new jersey coastline. just north of here about 30 mimes north in atlantic city, flooding is up to a foot in some areas. the boardwalk has broken off in pieces of about 30 feet floating down the street. we've seen some twitter pictures from some other local news correspondents who were actually able to stay there showing that flooding is very, very bad around the casinos and that the boardwalk is breaking up piece by piece from what we can see. atlantic city also is lower set than where we are here.

also seeing pictures of long beach island, popular new jersey vacation destination for wall streeters. the ocean is about to meet the bay there by the looks of the pictures. intense, intense flooding there. it's going to get worse later. if you can see what it looks like now, imagine just about eight hours from now, scott. >> kayla, thanks so much. stay safe down there. we'll hear from you throughout the day, obviously. kayla tausche down in cape may, new jersey. insurers are bracing for damage and probably for the worst from hurricane sandy as it approaches landfall. but will it live up to the catastrophic projections? let's welcome cliff galant, insurance analyst at kbw. welcome. >> good morning. >> what's been a fairly benign hurricane season certainly going out with a bang. >> yeah. i think that's an understatement. yeah. sandy looks like it certainly has the potential to be a very serious event. still a little bit early to know how bad it's going to be. this is an event which is just beginning. still unfolding. and we'll have to wait to see how bad it's really going to be.

>> what are you modeling in thus far? i've heard projections anywhere from $15 billion to $20 billion. obviously it's hard to know at this point. >> yeah. no, i think it is going to be a very serious event. it's going to be several billion, i think, at least. we're looking at the damages, you know, homeowners are certainly high at risk. these winds are going to be sitting over populated areas for several days. so there's going to be a lot of debris flying around. we're hoping not to see homes be toppled over. we're talking about damage to windows and roof. but that's potentially several billion. >> i was going to say, as you're speaking, we're looking at a live picture of montauk, new york, which is at the eastern tip of long island with some shingles that look like they could be airborne at any moment. do we know which insurance companies are best positioned? >> yeah. so, i mean, the industry is going to take a lot of losses. companies like allstate and travelers are all going to be there taking losses.

on the commercial property side as well with flooding there'll be some losses. but you have to remember, this is the business that these companies are -- this is what they do. they'll be prepared to help their policyholders. they'll often buy a lot of reinsurance. their balance sheets are actually pretty strong, particularly after what has been a benign year to date. i would assume the stocks would be weak when they open on wednesday, presumably. but that's probably a buying opportunity. you have to remember that that's what these companies do. >> have you taken a look to see which companies actually have the best reserves at this point? >> you know, i think actually -- >> is there one that stands out? >> chubb is a very high quality company that's going to take some losses here but probably the one with the strongest balance sheet. >> cliff, good to hear from you today. thanks so much for coming on. >> thank you. >> brian kelly, you have a trade on any of this on a day when, you know, the markets are closed? >> i think probably if you are long insurance stocks, look at

reinsurers. tray tra they traded in london or europe today. that's one place to look. if you happen to have electricity or you're not in the new york city area, watch the european markets and all those reinsurers playing out there. >> mike murphy is joining us from new york city. what would you do here? cliff suggests that the likely pullback that we're going to see once we do resume actually trading these stocks would be a buying opportunity. >> i couldn't agree more. when you look back over history, when these insurance stocks tend to trade lower after any sort of a natural disaster or any disaster at all, a lot of times the first cut is the deepest and they rebound from there. i'd be looking to go in there if these things are hit hard when the market finally opens, you want to go in. after these major catastrophes happen these insurance companies can jack up the premiums quite a bit. going forward they're taking in more money. you buy the initial pullback if it comes. >> scott, to brian kelly's point

as well as murph's, the reinsurers where some of the real risk is born. in other words, if this thing really slams the wrong way and we all are crossing our fingers and praying that it does not go the wrong way, but if it does, that's not going to be as bad for chubb and allstate as it will be for those reinsurers. in other words, the people that they passed off a lot of that risk to which does include warren buffett's berkshire hathaway. >> yes, sir. all right, guys. on the way we're tracking the monster storm as it moves toward the coast of new jersey. cnbc's brian shactman is riding out hurricane sandy out in montauk, new york. brian? >> reporter: listen, this is one of the wealthiest zip codes in all of america. a lot of famous people have property out here. coming up, we'll tell you what's at stake and for whom on "fast money halftime report."

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welcome back. let's get right back to our continuing coverage of hurricane sandy. our own brian shactman joins us live in montauk, new york. brian, what's the latest out there? >> reporter: scott, i basically want to point out this area

balloons to 100,000 people in the summer and goes down to 22,000 in terms of year round residents. i'm told many of them decided to stay. we hope that's an okay decision. included in that summertime population are a lot of famous people. we talked to a local official here to put it in some perspective for us. >> if you work yourself from the point all the way farther west, you'd hear names like paul simon, robert de niro, ralph lauren. every property with wind like this or sustained heavy winds could have some damage. so i fret for those properties as well as the other 22,000 of us that watch those properties on television or whatever. >> yawn winner is one name people right not know. founder of "rolling stone" magazine. it's a who's who. jerry seinfeld has a place in town. we are about two hours away from low tide. surf continues to get extremely intense. the nervousness here isn't about

a loss of business. we're in the low season. it's a weekday. it's more about the loss of property value and that kind of damage. here on the south side of the long island where the atlantic ocean is, a lot of the homes are up a little higher on some bluffs. on the north side of long island sound, if the storm follows this trajectory, a lot of those homes could rally be damaged if the storm surge is what they say it is. back to you. >> brian, thanks so much. you could look at a number of angles from all this. retail from home depot, coast c -- costco, walmart, target, name another one. >> if anything, the construction stocks, that type of thing. probably a little late to buy home depot or lowe's. a lot of people have already done the buying there. afterwards maybe a lumber liquidators or armstrong worldwide. i'd look at those names at the end of this week, beginning of next week. >> dr. j., you have to consider while many people went to those stores ahead of the storm, if

damage is anywhere close to what some think it will be, there's going to be a considerable amount of buying post-sanity as well. >> absolutely. masko. look at all the things that would need to be replaced, scott, from a combination of water damage to, of course, the drywall and, like brian says, the flooring which is a great call by him. we hope that's not what these poor folks that are experiencing the storm have to look forward to. but when you have to put that crystal ball on and you look at it, that's exactly where you'd go. you'd say the people that do the roofing and the construction there. people that put in the new kitchen cabinets and floors. that's where a lot of this money will be spent. i wouldn't be chasing home depot and lowe's right here. >> how are hedge funds trading the storm? kate kelly joins us on the fast line. like the rest of us there, they're worried about their families and their properties more so than their portfolios. but i guess it's -- it's worth considering what some of the biggest names are thinking on an event like this.

>> absolutely, scott. i'm sure you're right. they're worried about house and home and family, of course. but at the same time, you can't ignore these major weather events as a trading opportunity. the sense i'm getting this morning is that commodities traders are really split on how to handle sandy in the markets. some are bullish heating oil as seasonal supplies weren't great going into the storm and demand is expected to escalate once the storm hits. homes will be cold. people will be staying in and need more power and heat and so on. but that trade is now pretty crowded i'm told. you can see from the price run-up that it's become somewhat expensive to buy at the moment. going into today, there was also a run-up in gasoline as demand prior to the storm was thought to be high. some traders went long refined products in general and short crude oil or even long front month refined contracts and short future contracts, say six months out or a little longer. at this point i'm being told it may simply be too late to put on any anticipatory trades and the right time to take a wait and see attitude instead. especially with the markets

pretty thin today given that some of the floors are closed and people are not at their offices. probably the key indicator for trades later this week will be refinery and pipeline closures as well as details on whether cargo ships are getting in and out of east coast ports. keep an eye on that. we just got word the colonial pipeline, for instance, is making a contingency plan for shutting down. i have a refinery source telling me to look for a shutdown as early as this afternoon. >> kate, i'm just going to apologize, kate. unfortunately i have to interrupt you. let's listen to new jersey governor chris christie who is at a briefing. >> the president responded very quickly and the staff at fema, craig fugate and his staff, are outstanding folks. they helped us with our pre-landfall application to make sure we didn't have to go through -- oftentimes you go through a few drafts back and forth to make sure it has all the information you want. they helped us up front to make sure when we sent it in it was perfect the first time from their perspective. the president assured me yesterday on the telephone we'd

get his immediate personal attention. obviously it did. he signed it late last night. so it's going to allow us to have access to federal funding and federal assets we otherwise would not have without the preland fall declaration until after it was over when we asked for some declaration of emergency afterwards. we appreciate the president's efforts in that regard. he and his staff worked tremendously hard. >> has the storm gotten more intense than -- what does that mean for the area of the impact or the size? >> it's gone back and forth, michael, you know. i've heard them talk about it being more intense and less intense. although now it seems to us that it's more intense than what they predicted. and, you know, it's certainly because of the combination of events here. you know, the nor'easter, the hurricane, the high tides coming in twice with full moon. you know, this morning already.

then this evening again. that combination makes it, you know, incredibly dangerous. and something that, you know, again, we're going to see how it all turns out. but if it's on the course that it's on now, this will be something in terms of a flooding event that we haven't seen in a long time. [ inaudible question ] >> general? >> we have a starting perimeter of 45 miles. [ inaudible question ] >> i don't have a sense yet what the mindset is of people in shelters right now. what we know is typically what happens in these events, people have incredible anxiety both

about their own safety, safety of their property and loved ones in the other part of the state that they might have difficulty contacting. we have mental health counselors out there. we're sending them out as necessary, as needed to all the shelters. and we will provide the services that need to be provided to those folks to help them through the difficult time they're having. other questions from anybody? yeah? >> do you have any instructions at this point for people for tuesday? >> a little too early to tell yet, angie, although it's certainly trending in my mind towards -- towards closure of state government operations on tuesday as well. and schools. it's trending in that direction. i know that i think over 300 schools have already made the decision to close on tuesday. so i think that's trending in that direction. but i want to wait and see what the track does in the next four or five hours. you know, you've heard us come up here and say different things over time over the last two days. i want to wait a little bit longer to make a decision on tuesday. i would say to you i'm trending in the direction of closing

state government operations on tuesday as well unless there's a significant change in the path of the storm. >> when will we -- >> i think tonight. i think tonight. i intend to brief all of you, i think, before -- before i ask the governor tonight, i believe. that's my general -- either i will or someone else will. probably me, though. [ inaudible question ] >> they're saying -- acknowledging again, michael, these are approximations. okay? we don't know for sure. but the current approximation is around midnight tonight, right around the atlantic city area. so i think if you were responsibly reporting it you'd say it's going to land somewhere between atlantic city and northern ocean county and somewhere around midnight. might be 11:00. might be 2:00. the storm has a mind of its own. and it's moving at a very slow

pace. >> chris christie addressing reporters by giving an update on hurricane sandy. the expectations are the best guess is that sandy will come ashore around midnight around the atlantic city area but somewhere within a southern to the central new jersey coast. also saying that it seems at this point that the storm is more intense than predicted. also speaking of what he expects to be an unprecedented flooding event. we're also expecting comments within the next 30 minutes from president obama. we'll take you to those as soon as that happens as well. much more "halftime" as we track hurricane sandy, next. [ female announcer ] e-trade technology

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e-trade pro is so usable you'll actually use it. and our apps are the ultimate in mobile investing. become a better investor at e-trade. all right. welcome back. we continue to track hurricane sandy as it makes its way towards the northeast. again, expected to hit southern to central new jersey on the coastline sometime according to new jersey's governor just a few moments ago, around midnight this evening. more than 6% of the country's oil production lies in sandy's path. now faces total shutdown. cnbc contributor addison armstrong of tradition energy joins us now. a addison, more than two-thirds of

the east coast's refining capacity shut down already. i've read the top east coast refinery shutting down as well. 330,000 barrels a day. so gasoline seems to be the most impacted, is that right? >> yes, it has been. we saw a really strong runup really early this morning, fw gasoline futures up about 4%. markets pulmoed back since then. i think a little bit of what kate was saying early, this is news that's been factored in to the market is starting to come in. certainly the longer those refineries are out, the more bullish this impact will be given that inventories for distillate fuel in particular are about 20% below where we were -- i'm sorry. about 20% lower than the five-year average. already a tight supply situation being compounded by the shut-ins. >> any precedent we can draw from from past storms and a shutdown that has impacted refiners in the past? >> the only one that comes to mind is katrina. and the widespread flooding along the gulf where there's

obviously a lot more refiners down there than there are in the path of this storm. also keep in mind that that storm came at the end of the summer when gasoline driving season was really over. and we hadn't really started to think about winter fuel demand. so the actual shutdowns were not at a time when supplies would be tight. so it may be that we actually get a bigger impact this time around than we did then. >> how long does the refinery have to be shut down before we start to see a real material impact on gas prices? >> well, i think that it's just the -- i don't know if you have to see how long it's shut down. it's sort of the forecast for how long it'll be shut down. because, after all, refineries do take a long time to turn around. the longer they're without power, the longer it takes to get them back going again, this could be a storm that knocks out really an incredibly large amount of power. they're talking about 10 million homes and businesses potentially being impacted by this just on the electricity side.

of course, refineries need electricity to operate. >> addison, i'd like to bring some of the traders in. brian kelly, we've already been talking about refiners because of the brent wti spread being as wide as it has been of late, right? >> yeah, absolutely. and really in particular what addison's talking about is heating oil as well. that spread is probably one of the largest you've seen in about 30 or 40 years. so there is quite a bit of supply shortage in the heating oil. but, addison, i guess my question would be, we've also seen west texas be negative today. down about a half a percent last time i looked. so when we open trading again let's call it thursday or friday, is the trade to be better maybe shorting oil as opposed to trying to buy these refiners? >> yeah. i think that oil, particularly wti here in the u.s., is set up for a bearish move anyway before this. and certainly given the demand -- the demand and destruction we're going to see

over the next few days from the refinery sector is just going to add to what should be some very large inventory numbers going forward on u.s. crude supplies. so i think just from a fundamental perspective that that is the way to play it once we come back in. >> addison, i'm just going to ask you to put your consumer hat on for a moment if you wouldn't mind. is there any possibility, have you even thought of the possibility of a gasoline shortage anywhere in the northeastern part of the united states if this event turns out to be more severe than people even expect it to be at this point? >> i think that's a distinct possibility. we're already -- have a lot of refineries in the u.s. are already -- we're already running at reduced capacity for gasoline as we're changing seasons, as that trade wasn't really profitable for them because the demand has been so poor. you add to that the potential for pipelines, long distance pipelines like the colonial pipeline, the buckeye pipeline, that bring refined products from

the gulf coast, from the midwest up into the northeast, if we lose a lot of electricity and pumping stations along those pipelines are down for an extended period of time, you know, that really could cause some short-term pinches in supply at local -- at certain localities. and certainly could really turn around prices that have been really getting a lot softer for consumers lately. >> just when you thought because crude prices have been coming down that consumers were going to catch a break, maybe not. addison, thanks. >> my pleasure. >> addison armstrong. mike murphy, have a trade here? >> i do, scott. i think one of the ways to play this, as you see refineries potentially going off again and this storm hitting the northeast in an area where a lot of major refineries could be hut, i think you go back to nat gas here. i don't know if it's an initial move after this storm. but we're sitting on an abundance of natural gas in this country. the nat gas stocks or nat gas in and of itself, i think that's a way near term and really long term out, i think that's the

future here. i'd be getting involved with nat gas names. still to come, the president's statement on hurricane sandy in just a few moments. there's a picture of the briefing room in white house down in washington. plus the latest forecast from the weather channel. i'm a conservative investor. i invest in what i know. i turned 65 last week. i'm getting married. planning a life. there are risks, sure. but, there's no reward without it. i want to be prepared for the long haul. i see a world bursting with opportunities. india, china, brazil, ishares, small-caps, large-caps,

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welcome back to our special and continuing coverage of hurricane sandy. as you know, the stock exchanges, new york stock exchange, nasdaq are closed today. we are, of course, still in the middle of earnings seasons. many companies postponed earnings report. we're seei ining anadarko earni popped a bit early. 84 cents versus 76 cents adjusted. it's a beat there on earnings per share. as we've seen so often during this earnings season, the revenue number coming in a little bit light. actual number $3.33 billion versus an estimate of 3.40. i think it's, you know, 63 or so percent of companies that have reported thus far have missed on the revenue side. so you can add anadarko to that list. mike murphy, you have a comment on anadarko as we were just

coming off that conversation with addison armstrong? >> i do, mike. you look at these numbers that are coming out. obviously we know from history these storms are short-term events. i think you want to -- hopefully everyone's safe, the storm's not real bad. but you look at a company like this, i think these guys are hitting. i look at valero. had a huge run. a little pullback. i'd be buying that also. i still would look at some of the nat gas names. a name we love is exco. very tied to natural gas prices. could get a spike in the short term. >> again, bottom line beat from anadarko as it comes out with its earnings a bit early on a day when the markets are closed. following the airlines as well today. it's taking as you might expect a huge hit from the hurricane. the storm has caused the cancellation of just more than 9,000 flights. many more likely expected there. cnbc's phil lebeau is on the ground at delta's operation center down in atlanta. phil, what's the latest?

>> scott, we're hearing from more airlines including delta about more cancellations. let's bring you up to speed in terms of what we've seen from sandy. yesterday was just the beginning in terms of cancellations. a total of just over 1,300. newark was the most affected airport. 6,800 flights canceled today. the most affected airport being philadelphia. then finally tomorrow, that's the number to watch. 2,594 cancellations. but that number is going to grow. listen to this. delta now canling all flights out of laguardia through tuesday at 8:00 p.m. all international flights out of jfk through tuesday night. united canceling all flights in and out of its three new york airports through tuesday evening and american suspending operations at nine airports, including the three in the new york area. at least through midday wednesday. one last thing. the financial impact, there's pros and cons. nobody's calculated exactly what the impact will be. on the positive side for the airlines, if there's a positive here, october is the slowest time of the year. the revenue loss is likely to be lower. the problem is it's an extended

shutdown. that means there's going to be a lower percentage of these flights that are rebooked. typically, scott, when you have a consolation evekons cancellat it's short term, 90%, 95% rebook. long term, 70% or 75% of the flights rebook. too early to know the exact impact financially for the airlines. but think about irene and then go up several percentages in terms of what it might cost the industry. guys, back to you. >> phil, thanks so much. phil lebeau. more coverage of hurricane sandy when we come back from this break. again, we're waiting on president obama to make a statement on the hurricane as well. see you back in a couple minutes.

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i'm happy. i'm happy. i'm happy. happy. happy. happy. happy. (together) happy. i love logistics. i'm eamon javers at the white house briefing room where we're expecting to see president obama momentarily. the president coming back from campaigning in florida this morning. he is now here at the white house and he's been at is situation room earlier today getting a briefing from top aides. we expect him to brief reporters in just a few minutes on exactly what he's hearing and the status here on hurricane sandy. of course, mitt romney has also canceled campaign events today and through tomorrow, guys. we're expecting some update here from the president. but this hurricane has really thrown a monkey wrench in the campaign season with the election just one week away, scott. >> yeah. speaking of the come paampaign,, as we wait for the president. mr. obama doesn't want to take

advantage of the situation. he is the president and does want to appear presidential a week or so away from the election. >> absolutely. we've been slicing and dicing this all morning trying to figure out who this hurts and who this helps politically. obviously for president of the united states to appear in that role as commander in chief at a time when americans are in danger and are hurting, that would be an advantage. if you just look at it very crassly, very politically as we have to do here a week out of election day. but obviously we've seen hurricanes turn bad politically for presidents in the past. if there is a bungling of the response by the federal government, that would obviously not play to the president's favor here. there's a lot of risk here on both sides. you can tell the romney campaign is feeling this as well. they announced that they were suspending their campaign events for this afternoon and for tomorrow as well. clearly the romney campaign does not want to appear to be overtly political at a time when americans are in danger up and down the eastern seaboard. here's the president. >> hello, everybody. i just received a full briefing from our energy response teams including fema and agencies that

are going to be helpful in the response and recovery efforts. the department of energy, the department of transportation, the department of homeland security and the department of health and human services. obviously everybody is aware at this point that this is going to be a big and powerful storm. and all across the eastern seaboard, i think everybody is taking the appropriate preparations. i've spoken to all the governors in all these states. they have issued emergency declarations. those have been turned around quickly here in the white house. we have prepositioned assets so that fema personnel are working closely with state and local governments. we're making sure that food and water and emergency generation is available for those communities that are going to be hardest hit. we anticipate that the center of the storm is going to hit landfall sometime this evening. but because of the nature of

this storm, we are certain that this is going to be a slow moving process through a wide swath of the country. and millions of people are going to be affected. so the most important message that i have for the public right now is please listen to what your state and local officials are saying. when they tell you to evacuate, you need to evacuate. do not delay. don't pause. don't question the instructions that are being given. because this is a serious storm and it could potentially have fatal consequences if people haven't acted quickly. the good news is, is that the governors and local officials, i think, have had a few days of preparation. there's been extraordinarily close coordination between state, federal and local governments. and so we're confident that the assets are prepositioned for an effective response in the aftermath of the storm.

but keep in mind that for folks who are not following instructions, if you are not evacuating when you've been asked to evacuate, you're putting first responders at danger. we're going to have to have search and rescue teams in and around multiple states all at the same time. although we've got coast guard and the department of defense all positioned, if the public's not following instructions, that makes it more dangerous for people and it means that we could have fatalities that could have been avoided. transportation is going to be tied up for a long time. and probably the most significant impact for a lot of people in addition to flooding is going to be getting power back on. we anticipate that there are going to be a lot of trees down. a lot of water. and despite the fact that the power companies are working very closely with their various state officials and local officials to make sure that they are bringing in as many assets as possible and getting those ready in preparation for the storm, the

fact is that a lot of these emergency crews are not going to be able to get into position to start restoring power until some of these winds have died becaus this storm, that may take several days. so the public should anticipate that there's going to be a lot of power outages, and it may take time for that power to get back on. the same is true with transportation. there are going to be a lot of backlogs, and even after the storm has cleared it is going to take considerable amount of time for airlines, subways, trains and so forth potentially to get back on schedule depending on the amount of damage that has occurred. let me summarize just by saying that i'm extraordinarily grateful for the cooperation of our state and local officials. the conversations that i've had with all the governors indicate that at this point there are no unmet needs. i think everybody is taking this very seriously.

we've got prepositioned all the resources that we need, but right now the key is to make sure that the public is following instructions. for those of you who still need additional information about how to respond, you can go to ready.gov. that's ready.gov. that website should provide you with all of the information that your family needs in terms of how you can prepare for this storm. our thoughts and prayers go out to all the people who are potentially affected. we are extraordinarily grateful for our first responders because they are going to be working 24/7 around the clock non-stop. and i want to make sure that our thoughts and prayers go out to all those who may end up dealing with a very difficult situation over the next several days. last point i'll make though. this is going to be a big storm. it is going to be a difficult storm. the great thing about america is when we go through tough times like this, we all pull together. we look out for our friends, we

look out for our neighbors. and we set aside whatever issues we may have otherwise to make sure that we respond appropriately and with swiftness, and that's exactly what i anticipate is going to happen here. so i want to thank all the federal teams, state and local teams that are in place. i'm confident that we're ready. but i think the public needs to prepare for the fact that this is going to take a long time for us to clean up. the good news is we will clean up and we will get through this. >> what about the election, sir? >> i am not worried about the impact on the election right now. i'm worried about the impact on families and our impact on the first responders. i'm worried about the impact on our economy and on transportation. the election will take care of itself next week. right now, our number one priority is to make sure that we are saving lives, that our search and rescue teams are

going to be in place, that people are going to get the food, the water, the shelter they need in case of emergency, and that we respond as quickly as possible to get the economy back on track. thank you, everybody. >> we've ben listening to president obama make statements regarding hurricane sandy, giving an update saying what the weather map that you're looking at right on your screen already shows. in the president's word, this is going to be a big and powerful storm, yet he does say that he is confident that the assets are prepositioned to respond. when asked what he thinks the impact will be on the election, the president saying he's not at all worried about that impact. he's more worried about the economy and on transportation, mentioning that it is going to take several days for airlines and other transportation systems to get back up to speed in the aftermath of hurricane sandy. much more on the other side of this break. le announcer ] at scottrade, you won't just find us online, you'll also find us in person, with dedicated support teams at over 500 branches nationwide.

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welcome back to our special and continuing coverage of hurricane sandy as the storm makes its way towards the northeastern part of the united states. the latest indication that the storm will hit somewhere around atlantic city, new jersey. that's the southern part, the south central coastline of new jersey some time around midnight this evening. we've heard from the governor of new jersey. we've heard from the president just a short time ago giving an update saying the storm will be big, it will be powerful, it will take several days for transportation systems such as airlines to get back up to speed

that he's not so much worried about the election where people will go to the polls a week from tomorrow, that he's more concerned about the impact on transportation on the economy and that sort of thing. guys, brian kelly, when you talk about the airlines, let's go to johnna jari najarian on the air. any chance you take a stab at the airlines? >> i think what we heard from addison armstrong, judge, regarding that we might have that short term squeeze. in other words, short term where they are taking the hit obviously with resogsing aircraft, getting it out of harm's way as well as losing revenue for several days. that is a killer for the airlines but then throw on top of that that the spot price of jet a is going to be extraordinarily high in most circumstances, that might come down after this glut has worked through, judge. to could be a very short-term impact but look for these stocks

like lcc be u.s. air, delta, dal, united, continental, look for all of those to take a little bit of a hit here and the longer this extends with the flight shutdown, the more hit that will be. >> doc, i wonder what the hit would be for a delta airlines. delta bought its own refinery not all that long ago. right? >> yep. but unfortunately, it's one of the refineries that's more or less in the path of the storm. it's right there in pennsylvania. it is not a coastal refinery, judge, but nonetheless this will be impacted by that. and that was more or less a hedge, of course, so that they could not be held hostage by the other jet fuel makers. that's not like they ship from that point to the rest of the airports around the country. but that's a very good point. they're the only airline with that right now. >> delta does have a considerable presence in -- at laguardia airport here as well as obviously its hub down in atlanta. j.j., there's already major questions about the nation's airlines and the business not

being all that great. getting a boost from lower oil prices in the last several weeks, but this probably can't help things. >> no, it can't. but actually jon just talked about the airlines. based on what phil said in his report about them not really rebooking as many flights as they would have liked to, i really see this as kind of an opportunity for the price lines and orbitz of the world as people will be scrambling right now to get whatever flights they can. on top of that, you look at rental car services like hertz. again, there's going to be some opportunities created in those areas right now because the airlines are having trouble getting things done in terms of rebooking and who knows how big this glut of flights will be on the back end. >> mike murphy, your thoughts? >> i like the way j.j. was going with that. i think there is opportunity here after this storm moves out of the way. one thing i would point out, hertz should do phenomenally well, but louisiana pacific, lpx, is a company that's going to do well. there is opportunity when we finally get the marked opened. and facebook should see a lot of fi